Chicken-Rice Casserole

I don’t like grocery shopping.  Despite the abundance of awesome food available, and the fact that I’m enjoying cooking a lot more these days, grocery shopping remains a chore that I just don’t enjoy.  I think it’s the unpacking actually — if the food could magically move from my cart into my refrigerator and pantry, I might enjoy it more.  (And if my clothes magically folded themselves and appeared in my dresser, I’d enjoy laundry more too.)

In any case, I don’t like grocery shopping.  I make it slightly less painful by planning out five or six dinners before we go so that I know exactly what I need to buy.  Last week while perusing our collection of recipes, I came across a recipe I got from my mom years and years ago for chicken-rice casserole.

If you are interested, here’s the recipe.  There are a lot of variations on this theme, but this is the one my mom made when I was a kid.  It was really easy and tasted EXACTLY like I remembered.  Warm, creamy, gooey, and probably not healthy — in other words, a total comfort food.  This version doesn’t have any vegetables in it, so I made asparagus to go along with it since I figured we needed something green!

Chicken Rice Casserole

2 cups cooked chicken
2 cups cooked rice
1 can cream of celery soup
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 small onion, chopped
1 can water chestnuts, drained
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup mayonnaise
1 1/2 cup bread crumbs or dry stuffing
4 tsp butter

Mix everything except the bread crumbs and butter together in a large bowl.  Pour the mixture into a greased casserole dish or baking pan.  Melt the butter and mix with the bread crumbs/stuffing.  Cover the chicken-rice mixture with the buttered bread crumbs.  Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until bubbly.  Makes 6-8 servings.